Concept

Surfing

Overview

Surfing is a surface water sport in which an individual, a surfer (or two in tandem surfing), uses a board to ride on the forward section, or face, of a moving wave of water, which usually carries the surfer towards the shore. Waves suitable for surfing are primarily found on ocean shores, but can also be found as standing waves in the open ocean, in lakes, in rivers in the form of a tidal bore, or wave pools.

Surfing includes all forms of wave-riding using a board, regardless of the stance. There are several types of boards. The Moche of Peru would often surf on reed craft, while the native peoples of the Pacific surfed waves on alaia, paipo, and other such watercraft. Ancient cultures often surfed on their belly and knees, while modern-day surfing is most often stand-up surfing, in which a surfer rides a wave while standing on a surfboard.

Body surfing, in which the wave is caught and ridden using the surfer's own body rather than a board, is very common and is considered by some surfers to be the purest form of surfing. The closest form of body surfing using a board is a handboard which normally has one strap over it to fit on one hand. Surfers who body board, body surf, or handboard feel more drag as they move through the water than stand up surfers do. This holds body surfers into a more turbulent part of the wave (often completely submerged by whitewater). In contrast, surfers who instead ride a hydrofoil feel substantially less drag and may ride unbroken waves in the open ocean.

Three major subdivisions within stand-up surfing are stand-up paddling, long boarding and short boarding with several major differences including the board design and length, the riding style and the kind of wave that is ridden.

In tow-in surfing (most often, but not exclusively, associated with big wave surfing), a motorized water vehicle such as a personal watercraft, tows the surfer into the wave front, helping the surfer match a large wave's speed, which is generally a higher speed than a self-propelled surfer can produce. Surfing-related sports such as paddle boarding and sea kayaking that are self-propelled by hand paddles do not require waves, and other derivative sports such as kite surfing and windsurfing rely primarily on wind for power, yet all of these platforms may also be used to ride waves. Recently with the use of V-drive boats, wakesurfing, in which one surfs on the wake of a boat, has emerged. As of 2023, the Guinness Book of World Records recognized a 26.2 m (86 ft) wave ride by Sebastian Steudtner in Nazaré, Portugal, as the largest wave ever surfed.

During the winter season in the northern hemisphere, the North Shore of Oahu, the third-largest island of Hawaii, is known for having some of the best waves in the world. Surfers from around the world flock to breaks like Backdoor, Waimea Bay, and Pipeline. However, there are still many popular surf spots around the world: Teahupo'o, located off the coast of Tahiti; Mavericks, California, United States; Cloudbreak, Tavarua Island, Fiji; Superbank, Gold Coast, Australia.

In 2016, surfing was added by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as an Olympic sport to begin at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Japan.

The first gold medalists of the Tokyo 2020 surfing men and women's competitions were, respectively, the Brazilian Ítalo Ferreira and the American from Hawaii, Carissa Moore.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

Possible passages

Found by search and not yet checked by a person; they may only mention the idea in passing.

4. There is another aphya derived from fish, for that which is called cobitis is derived from small and inferior gobii, which bury themselves in the earth. The membrades are produced from the phalerica. The trichides come from these, and the trichiæ from the trichides; from one kind of aphya, which inhabits the port of Athens, the encrasicoli are derived. There is another kind of aphya which originates in the mœnis…
Aristotle, Aristotle's History of Animals In Ten Books
States what Surfing is.
Read the chapter · Open in the reader
So the water of fountains must needs go upwards, the extrinsic air succeeding into the vacuity and throwing the water out. In a close house, that keeps in the air and wind, the floor sprinkled with water causes an air or wind, because, as the sprinkled water falls, the air gives way. For it is so provided by Nature that air and water force one another and give way to one another; because there is no vacuity in which…
Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3
Close in meaning to Surfing; the term itself is not named.
Read the chapter · Open in the reader
It may be well just to draw attention to the degree of complexity here produced in the line of movement by the variety of forces at work. In atmospheric currents, and still more clearly in water-courses (to which might be added ocean-streams), the route followed is too complex to be defined, save as a curve of three dimensions with an ever varying equation.
Herbert Spencer, First Principles
Close in meaning to Surfing; the term itself is not named.
Read the chapter · Open in the reader

Philosophers who discussed Surfing

Marshall McLuhan

Related ideas

Place in the tradition

Part of Philosophy of sport.

Explore Surfing in the interactive graph →